


Three Times The Laughs, Three Times The Fun

by GraySonOfGotham



Series: Triplet Jokers AU [1]
Category: Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Birthday Party, Fluff, Kidnapping, M/M, Triplets, casual conversations, pink teddy bear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-22
Updated: 2018-02-22
Packaged: 2019-03-22 11:21:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,552
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13763058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GraySonOfGotham/pseuds/GraySonOfGotham
Summary: Gotham City is home to not one, not two, but three Jokers.Triplets.





	Three Times The Laughs, Three Times The Fun

It wasn’t the first time Batman had been tied up or ended up in some sticky situations, but it certainly was a first that he would find himself here without any backup.

Bruce had another argument with Damian earlier that day, forbidding Robin from accompanying the Bat on patrol. He was halfway through his normal run of the city when Alfred notified him that Damian was gone but had left a note saying that he had gone to Metropolis because Superboy needed assistance on something.

While Bruce had been slightly ticked off about it, he decided to talk to Damian later.

While he was deep in thought, Bruce noticed someone darting into a nearby alleyway. Taking out his binoculars, equipped with night vision, he focused on the figure, now scaling the wall of the alleyway.

As Bruce realized who it was, an explosion went off in the distance.

“Alfred, something’s happening. It’s the Joker,” Bruce growled, immediately leaping of the Batmobile.

He grappled onto the rooftop, where he had seen the Joker climb up on. From the roof, Bruce could clearly see the burning buildings in the distance, and not so distance, cackling.

Growling, Bruce leapt after the quickly escaping Joker.

The chase was rather brief, as Joker didn’t realize that the Bat was on his trail, and probably thought he had a little more time before he was expecting any company.

But as Bruce tackled the clown to the roof, he saw Joker’s eyes open a bit wider in a surprise before his mouth split into a grin.

“Batsy! How considerate for you to drop in!” More typical Joker-esque cackling.

A punch to the jaw. “How many were in that building?” Bruce growled.

Joker just turned back to him, laughing hard. “So, so many! You couldn’t have saved them all, even if you tried!”

Bruce punched him again. Joker giggled, his lip bleeding now. He licked at it. “It was nice to see you, Batsy, but you see, I’m in, ah, a bit of a hurry here. Save me a dance though?”

Joker twisted around, pulling Bruce’s head down and slamming it into the concrete. Bruce let go of his grip on Joker’s arm and the clown wiggled out. Bruce scrambled after the Joker as the man leapt straight off the side of the building. There were no other building below, and nothing to break his fall.

Without much thinking, Bruce shot a grapple to the building across from the one he was currently on. Then he swung off, diving after the Joker.

As his gloved hand circled around a thin waist, he heard Joker’s slight sound of surprise. They shot back up to the other building. As they landed on top, everything happened at once.

Bruce barely had any time to react. A large needle was stuck through the thick kelvar covering his neck, and Bruce felt the prick. The effect was nearly immediate.

He let go of the Joker, falling to his knees, and Bruce felt that all the strength in his body was sapped out. His bones felt like jelly as he fell onto his face.

His consciousness was also swimming, but he heard people talking. Or did he?

“…do I deserve an Oscar for that acting or what?”

“Oh, yes, that was very good.” The answer sounded slightly sarcastic.

Someone grabbed Bruce’s hand. “You guys can help me, you know? He’s not light, unlike us. Even without struggling, I don’t doubt that he would crush me.”

Some grumbling and biting remarks returned. Then someone else grabbed his other hand. And two strong hands encircled his ankles. And just like that, Bruce was lifted away like he was a heavy bag of flour.

And then he lost consciousness.

~

Bruce awoke to someone slightly slapping his cheek. Groaning, Bruce turned his head away.

“Five more minutes, Alfred,” he muttered.

There was a light huff. “You’ve been asleep for an hour already! I’m bored, Batsy.”

At that, Bruce snapped awake, jerking slightly in the chair he had been tied tightly to. His eyes widened as he took in the Joker’s smiling face.

Joker was sitting in his lap, straddling him. He had taken off his usual purple suit, loosened his tie and had his bright orange shirt sleeves rolled up to his elbows. And his arms were lying on both of Bruce’s shoulders.

“Ah!” Joker said with a huge, leering smile. “There’s my blue-eyed boy!”

At first, Bruce was confused, then he realized that he did not have his cowl on. He looked down and saw that his cape and belt had been removed but the rest of his suit remained.

“What the hell, Joker,” Bruce growled.

Joker threw his head back and laughed. “Anger suits the Bat, but not the man underneath.” He traced a finger along Bruce’s jaw, and quickly removed it when Bruce tried to bit the offending appendage. “Handsome, though. Quite handsome. But not as handsome as my Bat.”

From behind him somewhere, Joker drew out the cowl and carefully fitted it over Bruce’s head. “There!” Joker slid off of Bruce’s lap. “Welcome to my humble adobe, my dear Batsy!”

It was then that Bruce realized that he was probably in one of Joker’s safehouses. The walls were covered in mismatching pieces of wallpaper. Purple stripes, green polka dots, orange flowers, and pink clouds. The entire thing was a mess.

“What do you want, Joker?” Bruce tried again, following Joker’s movements around the room.

“Why, Batsy, I wanted you to meet my brothers, of course! Well, I believe you’ve already met them, but never had a proper introduction,” Joker said, his hands absently rearranging a vase of purple flowers.

“Brothers?”

“Oh, they went to go get pizza, I think, but they should be back reaaaally soon.” Joker looked towards the door, which was behind Bruce.

Almost as if he knew it, the door behind Bruce opened. Turning quickly, Bruce craned his neck to see the new arrivals. Joker’s “brothers”.

“He’s awake!”

As the two new figures walked into Bruce’s peripheral vision, his eyes widened further, and he probably would have fallen from his chair had he not been tied to it.

There were _three_ Jokers.

One of the two new ones was carrying two boxes of pizza, and the other one had a large pink teddy bear hooked on his arm.

“Batsy, I got you a present!” The third Joker came over and placed the bear in Bruce’s lap. Then, in a loud whisper, “His name’s Bruce, after my uncle, of course.”

“What?!” Bruce couldn’t help but exclaim. “Have you been doing some sick experiments or something?”

The original (if he even is the original) Joker put his arms around each of the Joker clones.

“I know this is a _bit_ overwhelming, but it’s okay. And calling us all Joker will get hard pretty soon, so we all came up with names.” He pointed to Joker with the pizza. “He’s John.” He pointed to himself. “Jack.” Then he wiggled his finger at the Joker that gave Bruce the bear. “Jay.”

Looking over all three Jokers, Bruce really could not tell them apart. “You all look the same,” he said flatly.

Jay and Jack gasped. John just rolled his eyes. Bruce watched as John set the pizza down on a nearby table and left the room with a mutter.

Jay and Jack rushed to either side of Bruce.

“Don’t worry about him,” Jack said. “He’s moody. Kinda like you. All he does all day is read, read, plan evil plots, read, read, do illegal experiments, and read some more. The boring one, if you ask me. But I’m fun!”

“I’m fun too!” Jay chirped on the other side of Bruce. He giggled. “I’m your favorite, right? And adorable?”

Bruce stared at him like he was crazy. Well, he was crazy, but crazier than normal.

Jack smacked Jay’s hand, which had been creeping up Bruce’s shoulder. “He’s the overwhelmingly happy one.” With a roll of his eyes and wry smile, Jack continued. “Remember that one Halloween where all the chocolates were stolen from the shops and replaced with poisonous ones? And how for some reason, the truck that had all the _real_ chocolates tipped over into Gotham Bay while going over a bridge? Yeah, that was him.”

Jay scoffed. “You can’t blame me for having a sweet tooth! John doesn’t care for sugar, and you’re always worried about getting fat, so it’s no wonder I develop a craving for sugar all the time!”

“What the hell is going on,” Bruce muttered to himself.

“Well, you could’ve waited until you got to a safehouse before eating the chocolate! And in the end, there was no chocolate at all because you drove off the bridge!”

“It wasn’t my fault! A bird flew in front of the windshield and I didn’t want to hit it!”

“That’s not what you said last time! You said the Batwing pushed you off the bridge!”

“No, I didn’t!”

“Yes, you did!”

“No, you liar!”

John appeared again, grabbing the pizza box from the table. He was about to leave when he saw Jay and Jack arguing. Sighing heavily, he came over, and Bruce thought he would get them to stop yelling at each other and in his ears, but instead, he felt himself being tipped back.

He was slowly dragged away from the two arguing Jokers.

Through a door and into a dimly lit room. Bruce came crashing back down with a thump. Joker, John, didn’t say anything, instead going to sit at an olive green desk. A small light was clipped onto the side of the desk, and there were papers everywhere.

Some were pinned to the walls, others lying on the ground, a few scattered across a bed on the other side of the room.

It reminded Bruce of Tim.

He watched, slightly amused as John opened the pizza box and pulled out a large slice and bit into it, while reading whatever book was lying open on his desk.

“So you’re the mastermind behind all of Joker’s schemes?” Bruce asked, finding the silence slightly uncomfortable.

John slowly turned towards him with a glare. Bruce watched as he set the pizza down back in the box. John stared at Bruce through narrowed eyes for a while before his lips curved into a dangerous smile.

“Is that what they said? I’m flattered,” John said. Bruce expected his voice to be deeper than the other Jokers, but it was the same obnoxious higher pitched voice. “But I don’t care what they think. What do _you_ think?”

Bruce’s eyes narrowed. “I think you’re a complete psychopath and a murderer.”

His grin widened. “Oh, good. I was beginning to think you were going to go soft on me. It’s bad enough that there’s two of them. You know, Batsy. You and I? We’re not so much different.”

Bruce snorted. “In your dreams.”

John stretched, and Bruce could nearly hear his bones popping. “No, really. I mean, I don’t get out much, but I do hear a lot about you from my brothers. I think the last time we had a real heart-to-heart was… hm, the burning of Gotham Bridge. After you shipped me off to Arkham that time, I don’t think I’ve seen you since.”

Bruce did a quick calculation in his head. “That was over a year and a half ago. And is that how you all get out of Arkham so easily?”

John smiled, less deviously, but still plenty crazy. “Why, of course. Again, see, you don’t know so much about me, but I sure know lots about you.”

Bruce didn’t answer.

“You’ll see someday.” John walked back over to the pizza box, and continued eating. After a couple more bites, he tilted the box towards Bruce. “Pizza? Hope you’re not a picky eater. I like everything.”

Bruce saw the olives, with pineapples, with mushrooms, and ham and grimaced. “How did you even get pizza? I swear if you killed people-”

John waved a pale hand impatiently. “Of course not. They’re my favorite pizza shop and I certainly can’t have the owners suddenly dying. No, usually it’s just some threatening or I get other people to pick it up for me.” John tossed the crust into a trashcan by the door. It was a perfect shot, though he did it without looking. “If you’re not into my pizza. Jay also ordered pepperoni.”

“I’m not eating anything from you,” Bruce said. He tried to sound angry and upset, but it was actually quite hard. John was much less into antagonizing him, and wasn’t too bad of a conversationalist, though he does talk quite a bit.

“Suit yourself. I’m sure you don’t eat pizza anyways. Need to keep in shape if you’re going to be chasing my brothers across Gotham’s skylines for the rest of your life, right? And the food of us lowly criminals wouldn’t fit your aristocratic tastes, I’m sure.”

Bruce couldn’t help but scoff. “You’re wrong, as always. I do like pizza, but I just don’t like all _that_ on my pizza. I always get veggie. It’s D-” Bruce cleared his throat.

John cocked an eyebrow at him. “It’s what?”

“None of your business.”

“Well, _you_ were going to tell _me_ , so I don’t see why you’re getting all snappy about it,” John said, tossing another crust towards the door, this time, aiming at Bruce instead.

The pizza crust hit his forehead and landed in his lap. Bruce glared at the offending piece of food. There were lipstick marks around where John had bitten.

John snorted. “Don’t tell me you actually _like_ the crusts?”

Surprised, Bruce looked up. He paused for a second. “I do actually like the crusts. How did you know?”

John smirked. “You think you’re the world’s only detective?”

Just then, the door burst open and slammed into the back of Bruce’s head. He grunted, but didn’t say anything.

Someone poked their head in. Bruce didn’t know if it was Jay or Jack.

“Johnny? We have a slight issue.”

John sighed and set the pizza box aside. “What is it? I swear if one of you broke that vase again, I will kick you both out.”

There was no response for a second. “It was an accident, okay? I didn’t know you liked the vase so much!”

John sighed heavily. He sounded kind of tired. “What is it, Jack?”

Jack looked at Bruce quickly. “We’ve got a birdie flying where he shouldn’t be.”

Bruce sat up straighter.

“Probably looking for Bats,” Jack finished.

John shrugged. “So? He’s not getting in here.”

“But what if he does?” Jack asked urgently. His voice was bordering on a whine.

“He’d better not. I’m not moving all my stuff again. Besides, just go out and distract him or something,” John said, picking up a couple paper from the group and tossing them onto his desk.

Jack frowned. “But what about-”

“But it’s our birthday!” Jay, Bruce was assuming, also poked his head in. “You promised we could celebrate, just the three of us. And Batsy.”

John rolled his eyes. “I really don’t know why you guys insisted on doing this. No offense, B. Harley’s throwing us a party next week anyway.”

“But Batsy won’t be there.”

“Gather enough criminals there and he’d be sure to show up,” John said under his breath. “It doesn’t matter anyway,” John said. “Bats doesn’t like pepperoni.”

Jay frowned down at Bruce. “Why not? Pepperoni is one of the greatest inventions of the Italians!”

“Actually, it’s American. It only has an Italian name,” John corrected.

“Do I get a say in this?” Bruce dared to ask.

“No,” John snapped. He sighed again. “Why don’t you just let him go home then?”

Jay frowned harder. “No! I did not get a dance, so I want to celebrate my birthday with him!”

Jack chewed at his lip. “Jay, maybe it is a better idea to let Batsy go this time. We’ll have other birthdays.”

Jay growled, a sound that Bruce was quite unfamiliar with considering the Joker he knew was always smiling and laughing. “No! I will not let you two dictate how I spend my birthday! Just because you guys are older does not mean you get to control everything I do! You always take my credit, and my fun, and my hair products, and now you’re going to let that stupid Nightwing take my Bat!”

Jay stomped out of the room after that. There was an awkward silence after that. Jack gave Bruce a small smile. “He’s a bit of a jealous one, that Jay. But we love him. Most of the time.”

John just rolled his eyes again. “C’mon, let’s get you out of here, before Jay comes back. When he does, none of us will ever leave this room.”

Bruce was slightly alarmed at that. From what he had inferred in the time he’d spent in the presence of the three Jokers, he had thought that Jay was the most flamboyant of the three. Probably the one that had worn a dress that one day, and Bruce had been slightly apprehensive about chasing him across the roofs in case Joker fell off a building because of those stilettos that went with the dress.

John was the smarts of the three. While Bruce didn’t doubt that the other two were brilliant as well, but John obviously had a knack for knowledge. His hair was a bit unkempt, his clothes slightly more wrinkled than the other two and his posture more hunched.

Jack was a mixture of the two extremes. The most levelheaded, Bruce dared to say. A balance of his two brothers, and probably the middle child. And Jack was probably the one that Batman chased across the roofs most often.

A blindfold was tied over his eyes. Bruce made a sound of protest.

A chuckle. “Don’t worry, darling B. I won’t pull any knives on you. I like my opponents sharp minded. A _real_ challenge.”

Bruce huffed. “What, you don’t think I can beat your ass blindfolded?”

“No, I know you can’t.”

His chair was being dragged backwards again. Bruce tried to remember the ways they were going, counting the number of steps. Sounds of Gotham’s cityscape slowly grew closer. Finally, the blindfold was pulled off.

Bruce looked around. He was sitting on top of a building. Bewildered, he looked around. There was no way he had been pulled up stairs. He had no idea how he’d gotten there.

Three Jokers stood in front of him.

“Your things are over there.” John, Bruce could tell the differences a bit now, said, pointing towards one corner of the roof. Bruce could see his belt and his grapple gun lying there, along with the giant pink bear.

Jack spoke next. “Well, Batsy. It was nice getting to know you tonight. I’ll see you tomorrow, I guess. I’ve got big plans, after all.”

Bruce narrowed his eyes at that. John pulled on Jack’s elbow and the two walked away, towards the edge of the building. Jay stood in front of him, a large bundle in his arms.

Jay glared at him. “I wish I could stay mad at you, but I can’t.” He smiled widely. “I really wish you could’ve stayed, but I guess you’ve got things to get to. Maybe next time. I’ll be sure to send an invitation so you can plan ahead. But I’m keeping your cape. Both as insurance and as a present. You can get it back the next time you come around. Maybe.” Jay paused. Then he leaned in, hovering by Bruce’s face. He quickly pressed his lips to Bruce’s cheek, making a wet kissing noise. “Don’t forget you promised me a dance,” he whispered before running over to where his brothers were standing before Bruce could quite process what had happened.

The three turned back around to look at Bruce before they leaned backwards and dived off the building in synchronized motion. Jack gave him a little wave and Bruce was pretty sure Jay winked at him.

Not five minutes passed before Nightwing landed in front of him.

“What are you doing here, Batman? I’ve been looking all over for you! Alfred sent me a distress call because he thought something had happened to you, and you’re just sitting here?” Nightwing shook his head, grinning. He went around to untie him. “Woah, you gotta little something on your cheek there, B.”

Bruce growled, standing up and rubbing his cheek furiously. “Not a word.” He stalked over to where his equipment was and put his belt back on, shoving his grapple into its holster. Then he glared at the bear for a moment before picking it up as well.

“What’s that?” Nightwing asked. “Kinda cute, but not your color, I don’t think?”

Bruce glared at him again. “Nightwing.”

“Right, not a word,” Dick said, hiding a grin. “You’re also missing your cape, I hope you know that.”

“I have more.”

“I know, but how do you lose your cape? Unless you were undressed? Talk about slacking on the job,” Dick continued cheerily, clearing enjoying it.

Bruce just growled, clutching the pink stuffed animal closer to his chest as he leapt from building to building, hoping to leave Dick’s laughter as far behind him as possible.


End file.
